5 Rock Songs From 1969 That Sound Even Cooler Today

The world of rock music was reaching a high-water mark in 1969. More than half a decade on from Beatlemania, the 1960s counterculture, flower power, and psychedelia had utterly transformed the genre, which was now open to greater sonic experimentalism and a wider tonal palette.

But the end of the 1960s also saw the hippie movement turn in on itself. The legendary Woodstock festival was messed up in many ways, and disasters such as Altamont and the realization that some corners of the counterculture, such as the Hells Angels motorcycle club and the Manson Family cult, were inhabited by truly dangerous criminals was reflected in the music of the era, which grew increasingly sour in the years that followed. The Vietnam War continued to claim the lives of thousands of young Americans and resulted in several notable artistic statements, such as Jimi Hendrix's legendary and subversive performance of "The Star-Spangled Banner," which became a regular feature of his stage shows toward the end of the decade.

But while it is tempting to place the music of 1969 in its immediate context, the truth is that many of the songs recorded that year have proven to be timeless, and indeed have come to sound even cooler with the passage of time. Here are five songs from 1969 that have kept their cool, chosen for their continued listenability and appeal to modern listeners.

The Stooges are today hailed as one of the most influential bands of their generation, with a raw sound that subverted much of what was being released at the end of the 1960s. Arguably comparable only to The Velvet Underground in terms of their slow-burn impact on the artists that came after them, the Michigan band led by future star Iggy Pop released just three studio albums between 1969 and 1972, before splitting amid growing drug misuse and turmoil.

The Stooges commanded a loyal cult following but never gained commercial success during its first flush as a working band. Instead, it would take decades for the public to catch up and make The Stooges iconic, by which time the band's heavy, driving sound and Iggy's snarling, yelping vocals had become guiding lights for the punk movement.

Most fans would tell you that the Stooges' short discography is well worth exploring in its entirety, but that one song stands above all others as the band's crowning achievement: 1969's "I Wanna Be Your Dog." Built around a grinding 3-chord descending riff and Iggy's submissive, self-flagellating lyricism, the song was the antithesis of much of the music that had emerged over the previous decade, a distorted proto-punk downer that heralded the more nihilistic tone many artists would strike in the 1970s.

It might seem inconceivable in hindsight that when proto-punk was coming on in leaps and bounds, thanks to the arrival of bands like The Stooges, the Fab Four were still plying their trade as the biggest band the world had ever seen. Of course, The Beatles was not the same outfit that emerged back in 1962 with "Love Me Do." After embracing psychedelia, avant-garde influences, and new musical possibilities offered by new studio technologies, the band had put out a flurry of landmark releases, such as 1964's "Revolver" and 1967's "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," which placed The Beatles firmly at the vanguard of innovative popular music. The last album The Beatles would record together, "Abbey Road" – "Let It Be" was released later, but recorded earlier — arrived in 1969, and for many modern fans is arguably the band's most timeless release thanks to its pristine production and forward-thinking compositions. The John Lennon-penned opener, "Come Together," may be the coolest song the Fab Four ever recorded. 

Apparently influenced by a slogan used by LSD advocate Timothy Leary — and debatably having a sexual subtext — the song is propelled by a catchy bass groove that hooks the listener into Lennon's typically absurdist lyrics before the song's swaggering chorus. "Come Together" manages to be both effortlessly sexy and menacing, prefiguring much of the glam rock posturing of the early 1970s.

The Rolling Stones was going through some serious changes in 1969. In the summer of that year, the Stones lost founding member Brian Jones, who left the band amid growing drug addiction. His departure came in June, and in July he was found dead in his swimming pool, a shocking development that rocked the band and its fanbase. The year came to an end with the disaster at Altamont Speedway, an event characterized by the violence between the crowd and the band's bodyguards, the Hells Angels, which resulted in the killing of Black music fan Meredith Hunter. For many, that tragic incident was the moment that the dream of the 1960s counterculture died, and was undoubtedly the low point of the Stones' early career.

However, despite these tragedies the band retained its creative flair. The album "Let It Bleed," which was released in November and just a few short months after Jones' death, was received with mixed feelings by the band's listenership at the time due to its disturbing lyrical content, though it is now counted among The Stones' classic releases. The highlight is "Gimme Shelter," a doom-laden soul-infused rocker that sounds as Stones-y as possible, while also being utterly unlike anything else in the band's catalog. With anxious, elliptic lyrics and a soaring backing vocal provided by singer Merry Clayton, it's still adrenaline-inducing stuff today.

The anger of the youth in the 1960s was fueled by several big issues, including the Civil Rights Movement, intergenerational strife, and, of course, the Vietnam War. Towards the end of the decade, it was increasingly clear to the public that the U.S. military's attempts to stamp out communism in Asia were doomed to fail, and that young people were being sent to be maimed or die in unthinkable numbers for the sake of misguided foreign policy. Such frustrations were expressed abundantly in that era's music, but few as amply as Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Fortunate Son," which was released toward the end of the year. 

A short, fiery screed delivered by the band's principal lyricist, John Fogerty, the song criticizes the privileged few who used their wealth and influence to get their children out of being drafted into the brutal war. But the song also speaks to wider issues of wealth inequality. "The song speaks more to the unfairness of class than war itself," Fogerty once explained (via Udiscovermusic). "It's the old saying about rich men making war and poor men having to fight them." His anger still reverberates, and as the hundreds of millions of views garnered by the song's new 2018 music video attests, it continues to find a dedicated audience.

It has been said that Led Zeppelin was to the 1970s what The Beatles was to the 1960s: a seismic British band that conquered the world of rock music, changing it forever. But Zeppelin's story actually began in the 1960s, with the band assembled from the remnants of the defunct blues rock outfit The Yardbirds. Led Zeppelin is famous for its four self-titled studio albums, and for many listeners the band really hit its high point with "Led Zeppelin IV," which remains Zeppelin's most celebrated record. However, the band released both their debut and sophomore albums in 1969, the latter of which contained one of their finest cuts: "Whole Lotta Love." 

Undeniably based on Willie Dixon's classic "You Need Love," the song is one of Zeppelin's most overtly sexual tracks, which progresses from a rocking, headbanging groove to a strange, unstructured climax before locking back into the groove. It was a huge hit single in the U.S., became the theme song of "Top of the Pops" in the U.K., and has been frequently covered by artists who see it for what it is: a straightforward blues-rock number that still has the power to get audiences going.